5 Design Ideas to Steal from a French Style Icon for an Effortlessly Beautiful Garden

There’s an enigmatic quality to the garden of Cordelia de Castellane, author of Flower Couture and artistic director of Dior’s home and baby lines. Inspired by English gardens and located in the French countryside, the formal four-square layout is softened with lavender-edged beds that contain an utterly romantic mix of cutting flowers—foxgloves, peonies, delphinium, and David Austin roses, to name but a few.

The key to its success? Staggering the height of flowering vertical growers. Here, layered perennials come together like artwork—creating a space that balances order with a touch of wild romanticism.

Creating a Beautifully Layered Garden

From subtle borders to soaring climbers, Cordelia’s garden offers plenty of design ideas for creating layered interest, no matter where you live. Here are five design tips to try at home along with a list of blooms to consider.

1. Soften the Borders

Swap manicured hedges for fragrant drifts of lavender (as Cordelia uses) or catmint (Nepeta spp.). Despite the formal layout, these wispy mid-height plants gently blur the lines of garden beds, creating a relaxed feel. Lavender’s movement in the breeze and soothing scent add more sensory layers to the space.

Plant List:

• Lavender: A shrubby perennial that will attract pollinators to your garden, lavender blooms from late spring to midsummer. Prune after flowering to promote bushiness. Native to the Mediterranean, it thrives in full sun and well-draining sandy or gravelly soil.
• Catmint: Blooming from late spring through summer, catmint will often rebloom if cut back after the first flush of flowers. It’s also more easygoing than lavender—happiest in full sun and dry sandy soil but surprisingly tolerant of partial shade and moisture.

2. Anchor the Corners

Ground your garden’s corners with focal plants—shrubs, mounding perennials, or trios of smaller annuals. White-flowering cistus plays that role in Cordelia’s garden, where it’s planted in corners on either side of the central pathway to enhance symmetry. Other varieties of the bushy shrub, part of the rockrose family, flower in shades of pink and yellow.

Plant List:

• Cistus: Forming compact mounds (2-5 feet), cistus is a hardy, drought-tolerant shrub that blooms from late spring to early summer. Its flowers only last a day but it blooms often throughout the season and boasts fragrant foliage. Place it in full sun and well-draining soil.

3. Add Vertical Architecture

Incorporate obelisks within beds to draw the eye and give structure to trailing plants. In Cordelia’s garden, handmade chestnut-twig tuteurs were chosen for their rustic charm and durability. “We use them mainly for climbing roses and sweet peas, plants that bring fragrance and softness as they weave their way upward, adding a vertical flourish to the space,” she says.

Plant List:

• Sweet Peas: In the garden, these delicate blooms need a structure to ramble on but Cordelia favors their wildness in cut flower arrangements. “They immediately create a poetic, disorderly atmosphere,” she says. Grow sweet peas in full sun with rich, well-draining soil and deadhead often to promote continuous flowering.
• Climbing Roses: Despite their name, climbing roses need to be manually tied and trained to a supporting structure—be it an obelisk, trellis, or wires affixed to a wall. They prefer full sun with rich, loamy, well-draining soil. David Austin’s Olivia Rose Austin is one of Cordelia’s favorite varieties.

4. Plant for Height

Stagger plant heights to create rhythm and depth in borders. Begin with tall plants like delphinium or foxglove, then graduate to mid-height and smaller varieties such as stock and snapdragons. This layering mimics the painterly composition of classic English-style gardens.

Plant List:

• Delphinium: These stately spires thrive in full sun and rich, well-draining soil. Provide staking in windy areas and deadhead spent blooms for a second flush. Their bold vertical presence adds elegance and height to garden borders. Cordelia favors pale blue varieties.
•  Foxgloves: A cottage garden favorite, foxgloves prefer dappled shade and moist, well-draining soil. Their tall, tubular flowers attract pollinators and create a striking, naturalistic layering effect. These biennials self-seed readily so plant where you don’t mind some spreading.
• Stock: A mid-height annual, stock thrives in cool temperatures, making it ideal for spring and fall displays. Grow in full sun and well-draining soil, and pinch back young plants for bushier growth. Adds soft texture and a sweet scent to borders and bouquets.
• Snapdragons: These colorful blooms also thrive in cool weather, making spring and fall their peak season. Typically grown as annuals, smaller varieties peak between 15-30 inches tall and flower in a range of vibrant hues. Deadheading encourages another flush of flowers. Give snaps well-draining soil and full sun.

5. Consider Delicacy and Movement

Long-stemmed flowers, like cosmos and wild fennel, catch the light and dance with the slightest breeze. “They add height without heaviness,” Cordelia says, noting that they bring a sense of movement to the beds that is magical. “It’s like the garden is breathing,” she says.

Plant List:

• Cosmos: These airy annuals bloom freely in sun-drenched beds and attract bees and butterflies. Ideal for looser planting schemes, they will self-seed gently. Deadhead regularly and clip for bouquets to prolong their joyful display.
• Fennel: With its fine, feathery foliage and yellow umbels, fennel adds texture and movement. It thrives in full sun and well-drained soil. Let it bloom for pollinators, or cut early for foliage contrast.
• Japanese Anemone: A late-season perennial, this ethereal flower thrives in partial shade and moist, fertile soil. Aptly-named “wind flowers” have airy blooms that dance in the breeze, adding movement and a natural, unfussy feel to mixed borders.
• Gaura: With its wispy, butterfly-like blossoms, gaura adds lightness and motion to garden beds. It thrives in full sun, tolerates drought, and prefers well-draining soil. Plant en masse for a romantic, shimmering effect in borders.